Jockeys’ Dispute Over Broadcast Rights Remains

Jockeys Corey Black and Alex Solis were talking to reporters Sunday after a day of silence, but they won’t be giving television interviews, a practice that is expected to be followed by other riders at Santa Anita.

“I’m not doing any television interviews,” Black said. “About the other guys, I don’t know. This is my decision. We’re not the stars, so they don’t need us.”

The Jockeys’ Guild’s insurance agreement with the Thoroughbred Racing Assns. tracks, settled Friday, a day before the previous contract ran out, precluded the jockeys’ attempts to have their perceived broadcast rights recognized.

The jockeys have attempted to use these rights as a bargaining chip since 1968. The tracks question the validity of the rights, which the jockeys say apply to national telecasts of races and simulcast coverage.

The tracks say that there are only 10 races--the three Triple Crown stakes and the seven races on Breeders’ Cup day--that bring them television rights revenue, and they say that telecasts from simulcasting boosts the handle, resulting in larger purses that the jockeys share in.

Black rode Snow Kidd’n to victory Sunday in the $111,600 California Breeders’ Champion Stakes. On Saturday his mount, Denim Yenem, ran second to Solis’ horse, Call Now, in the Pasadena Stakes, and both riders declined to give newspaper interviews after the race.

Solis won an earlier race on Sunday’s card, riding Del Mar Dennis to victory in the $61,225 Ack Ack Handicap. Because of a foul claim, Kurt Hoover, co-host of Santa Anita’s races on a simulcasting network, didn’t have time to do a post-race jockey interview. Later, Solis told Hoover that he wouldn’t have given an interview had he been asked.

This is not the first time the jockeys have attempted to make a point via television. On Breeders’ Cup day at Churchill Downs on Nov. 6, while the guild and the TRA were locked in bargaining, winning jockeys wore baseball caps with No. 47 on them in the winner’s circle, and then deflected NBC’s questions about the races by referring to the 47 riders who are permanently disabled. The Churchill stewards had prohibited the jockeys from wearing “47” stickers on their boots during the races.